Questions to Ask a Grant Writer
For a nonprofit director, board member or development lead about to hire for grants, these are the interview questions to ask grant writers before anything is signed, whether the person across the table is a freelance grantwriter or a candidate for a staff post. They run in the order the decision does: track record, how the writer thinks and drafts, funder research and fit, how the work would run between you, fees and the contract, and what happens after a deadline. The guide says which questions change when the hire is an employee instead of a contractor.
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The questions
Each question, and why to ask it
Track record
What kinds of organizations have you written for?
Why ask it
You are listening for whether they have worked in your field and at your size. Somebody who has raised money for hospitals may know none of the funders who give to a two person arts nonprofit, and knowing who funds what in your field is much of what you are paying for.
How many proposals did you submit last year, and how many were funded?
Why ask it
A success rate means little without the denominator and the type of funding attached. A renewal from a foundation that already knows the client is a different contest from an open government competition, so ask for the split between the two instead of accepting one headline percentage.
Which funders do you know best: private foundations, corporate giving programs, or government agencies?
Why ask it
The three read like different trades. A family foundation may want a three page letter, a corporate program an online form tied to its own priorities, and a government agency a long application scored line by line against a published rubric. Hire for the kind you plan to approach most.
Have you written to any of the funders on our list before?
Why ask it
Someone who has applied to a funder knows its form, its pace and what its staff ask about, which saves you a round of mistakes. Be careful with anyone who presents that familiarity as influence, because the decision belongs to the funder's board or reviewers and no outside writer can deliver it.
Can we read two proposals you wrote, including one that was declined?
Why ask it
A funded proposal reflects the organization as much as the prose, so the declined one is often the better sample of the writing. Expect names and figures to be blacked out, since past clients are owed confidentiality, and be wary only if nothing at all can be shown.
In that sample, which parts are your writing and which came from the client's staff or an older draft?
Why ask it
Proposals are stitched together from years of earlier applications, so a polished sample may be mostly inherited. Ask them to point to a section they built from interviews and raw numbers, because that is the work you would be paying for.
What is the largest award you have written that was funded, and what is typical for you?
Why ask it
The typical figure matters more than the largest. Somebody whose work is mostly five thousand dollar community grants is doing a different job from somebody writing seven figure government applications, and both are legitimate. Set the answer beside the size of award your team could actually manage.
Can we speak with two clients, including one you no longer work for?
Why ask it
Ask each reference whether drafts arrived early enough to review, how the writer coped when information was missing, and whether they would hire again. The former client is the one who can tell you how the arrangement ended and what was handed back.
How did you learn this work, and how do you keep up with what funders now ask for?
Why ask it
In most places nobody needs a licence to call themselves a grant writer, so the route in tells you a lot. Some hold a credential or belong to a grant professionals association with an ethics code, and years on staff at a nonprofit count for at least as much. Listen too for how they follow changes in application forms.
Have you ever sat on the funder's side, as a reviewer or on a grants committee?
Why ask it
A person who has scored a stack of applications knows how quickly each one is read and where points are lost. It is not a requirement, but it changes how a writer handles headings, summaries and the first paragraph of every answer.
Their approach
Walk us through how you get from a funder's guidelines to a submitted proposal.
Why ask it
A sound answer starts with reading the guidelines and scoring criteria and building an outline against them, then interviews, a draft, review rounds and a buffer before the deadline. If the description begins with writing, the close reading of the funder is probably being skipped.
Tell us about a proposal you believed in that was turned down. What did you change afterwards?
Why ask it
Every working grant writer has a drawer of declines, so the story should come easily. Notice whether they went back for the reviewers' comments, and whether the blame lands entirely on the client or the funder.
From what you have seen so far, how would you describe our work in two sentences?
Why ask it
It shows whether they looked at your website and last annual report before the call. A rough answer is fine. You are checking for plain language and whether they noticed who you serve, which is what a reviewer will need from page one.
How do you write about need without making the people we serve sound helpless?
Why ask it
Funders want evidence of a problem, and the people described will sometimes read what was said about them. The approach to hope for sets local data beside what the community already does for itself, and borrows the words participants use about themselves.
What do you do when the character limit is far shorter than what we want to say?
Why ask it
Online forms cut text off at the limit, so cutting is as much the job as writing. You want to hear that they answer the question asked first and let organizational history go, and that they will tell you plainly which favourite paragraph did not survive.
How do you turn what our program does into outcomes a funder can measure?
Why ask it
Counting people served is an output, and most funders also want to know what changed for them. A careful writer starts from what you already track and will not promise a measure you cannot collect, because the report a year later is written against those same promises.
Do you use AI tools when you draft, and what of ours would go into them?
Why ask it
Plenty of writers now use them for outlines or trimming, and funders differ on whether that has to be disclosed, so ask how it works for each one you apply to. Settle what stays out of any outside tool, such as participant stories and unpublished financials, and who checks every figure in the draft against your records.
What do you do when we cannot describe the program clearly ourselves?
Why ask it
This is the real work in most engagements. Good writers say they will interview program staff and draft something for you to correct, which takes staff time you need to plan for. Anybody who says it is never a problem has not done much of this.
Looking at us from the outside, what is most likely to get our applications declined?
Why ask it
It asks for an assessment before they are hired, which is the closest thing to a free work sample you will get. Useful answers name something structural: thin outcome data, no audited financials, or programs described in language funders do not use.
What would make you decide not to take us on?
Why ask it
Anyone experienced has criteria: no board engagement, an unrealistic budget, an expectation that grants will cover an operating deficit, a director who will not sit for an interview. The list tells you what they think a workable client is, and whether you are one.
Funder fit
Do you do prospect research, or writing only?
Why ask it
These are separate skills and many writers do only one of them. If you do not already have a pipeline of funders whose priorities match your programs, hiring a writer with no research capacity means paying for good prose aimed at the wrong people.
Where do you look for funders, and is the cost of those databases inside your fee?
Why ask it
Typical sources are subscription databases, funders' own websites and annual reports, and the published grant lists of organizations like yours. In the United States a private foundation's public tax filing also lists the grants it made, and elsewhere it is worth asking what registers exist. Find out whether a subscription is being billed to you.
What does a funder have to show before you would tell us to apply?
Why ask it
Listen for a checklist: it funds in your area, it gives awards of a size you can use, it accepts applications without an invitation, and it has funded groups like yours. A writer who cannot name their tests is choosing by instinct or by whichever deadline is nearest.
Would you ever advise us to reshape a program to suit a funder?
Why ask it
Small additions are ordinary, such as an evaluation step a funder asks every grantee for. Building a new service because money is on offer is how organizations end up with grants that cost more to deliver than they bring in, so you want the person drafting to say when a stretch has gone too far.
Have you ever told a client not to apply for something?
Why ask it
A writer paid per proposal has an incentive to apply for everything. Somebody who can describe a specific occasion when they advised against an application is showing you the judgment that is actually worth hiring.
How many applications a year would you plan for an organization our size?
Why ask it
There is no correct number, and the reasoning is what you are after. Good planning starts from how many grants your staff could deliver and report on, then works back to how many applications that takes. A plan that begins with volume is built around the writer's invoices.
Are we ready for government funding, or should we begin with foundations?
Why ask it
Public grants often come with registrations, audit requirements and payment only after you have spent the money, which a small organization may not be able to carry. The rules vary by country, state and agency, so ask how each works for the programs you have in mind. An honest writer will say when you are a year away.
How long should we expect to wait before the first award arrives?
Why ask it
Funders commonly take months to decide, and a first application to a new funder is often a way of getting known. Someone hired in spring is unlikely to close a gap in this year's budget, and a writer who lets you believe otherwise is setting up a hard conversation with your board.
Will you talk to program officers, and in whose name?
Why ask it
Some funders expect contact from the organization rather than a contractor, and a call from an outside writer can count against you. Agree who makes the first approach and how the writer gets described if a program officer asks.
Do you write for other organizations that go to the same funders we do?
Why ask it
In a small field the answer is often yes, and that alone is not a conflict. Ask how they handle two clients competing for one grant: whether both are told, and how each client's strategy and figures are kept from the other.
Working together
What do you need from us before you can start?
Why ask it
The answer should be specific: recent financial statements, an organizational budget, the program logic, outcome data, a board list and proof of your charitable status. If they say they can work from a conversation, expect to be rewriting their draft yourself at midnight.
Who on our staff will you need, and roughly how many hours of theirs does one proposal take?
Why ask it
Expect to hear the program lead, whoever keeps the books and the director named, with a rough number of hours for each. That time never appears on the writer's quote, and it is usually what decides how many applications a small team can manage in a year.
Who writes the budget, and who signs off on the numbers?
Why ask it
Reviewers read the budget against the narrative, and it also has to reconcile with your actual accounting. A writer can assemble one but your finance person has to own it, and that boundary should be settled before the first deadline rather than the night before it.
What is your turnaround, and how far ahead of a deadline do you need our materials?
Why ask it
Many writers ask for everything two or three weeks before submission, because a portal upload can eat an afternoon and a signature can take a week. Get the number in days and write it into the agreement, so that a late handover from your side is a known cost and not an argument.
How many rounds of review are included, and who on our side should read the draft?
Why ask it
Two rounds is a common arrangement, and the price of a third should be known in advance. Send one combined set of comments, with a program person checking facts and a leader checking what is being promised. Review by the whole board adds a week and rarely improves a sentence.
Who collects the attachments: letters of support, the board list, the audit, staff resumes?
Why ask it
Attachments depend on other people, which makes them slower than the narrative. A partner's letter of support can take weeks to come back signed, so decide now who asks, who chases and who checks each file against the funder's list.
Who does the last check of the finished application against the funder's instructions?
Why ask it
Page limits, required headings, file formats and the order of attachments are checked before anyone reads the argument, and some funders set aside applications that break them. The check is best done by a person who did not write the draft, with the funder's own list in hand, a day or more before submission.
Who submits the application, and who holds the portal logins?
Why ask it
Government grant portals usually need the organization registered first, and those registrations can lapse and take weeks to renew. How that works depends on the country and the agency, so check each system you will use well ahead of time. Whoever presses submit, the accounts belong to you, so keep the logins yourselves.
How do you track deadlines and requirements across funders?
Why ask it
Ask to see the actual calendar or tracker, with submission dates, report dates and the windows when you become eligible to reapply. Renewals are the easy ones to lose, because nobody announces them and the reminder has to come from your own records.
How many clients do you have, and what happens when our deadline lands in the same week as one of theirs?
Why ask it
Funder deadlines bunch together at certain times of year, so the clash will happen. Ask whether they cap their client list and how early they would warn you. An honest 'I would tell you a month ahead' beats a promise that it never comes up.
Will you write everything yourself, or do other writers work under you?
Why ask it
Subcontracting is ordinary in a busy practice and no problem when it is disclosed. What you need is the name of whoever interviews your staff and drafts the narrative, and an assurance that they are bound by the same confidentiality terms.
Fees and contract
How do you charge: hourly, per proposal, or on retainer?
Why ask it
Each structure has its own failure mode. Hourly needs a cap, per proposal needs a written definition of what counts as one, and a retainer needs an agreed volume of work. Ask which they prefer for a client like you, and why.
Do you ever work for a percentage of what is awarded?
Why ask it
The ethics codes of the main grant and fundraising professional bodies rule out pay tied to a percentage of the award, and some funders refuse costs charged that way. Anyone offering it is working outside those codes, and somebody paid only on a win has no reason to tell you an application is a long shot.
What would a proposal like our next one cost from first call to submission?
Why ask it
Name a real funder and its application so the figure is tied to an actual page count and attachment list. A range in writing lets you compare candidates, and the gap between the low and high end tells you what they expect to go wrong.
What is left out of that price?
Why ask it
Common exclusions are prospect research, building the budget, typing answers into the portal, resubmitting after a decline, and reports. None of those is unreasonable to bill separately, but each one you do not hear about now arrives later as an invoice.
When do we pay: a deposit, on submission, or monthly?
Why ask it
Deposits and payment at set stages are both ordinary. What matters is that every payment is tied to work delivered, such as an outline, a full draft or a submitted application, and none to the funder's decision, which arrives months later and is out of the writer's hands.
Can any of your fee go into the grant budget, or do we pay it from other funds?
Why ask it
Funders generally will not pay for the cost of applying to them, though some allow evaluation or grant management costs after an award. The rule belongs to each funder, so ask how it works there before a fee is written into a budget, and plan to pay the writer from unrestricted money.
Would you begin with one paid proposal before we commit to a retainer?
Why ask it
A single application shows how they interview staff, treat a deadline and take edits, which no conversation can. Offer to pay the normal rate for it. Asking for a free trial proposal is asking for unpaid work, and the writers worth hiring will decline.
What happens to the fee if a deadline is missed, whether the delay was ours or yours?
Why ask it
Ask for the policy before it happens, in both directions. If your materials came late, a clear rule such as work stops and the fee still stands is fairer than a vague accommodation. If the writer ran late, find out whether the fee is reduced or the draft is carried to the funder's next cycle at no charge.
Is there a minimum term, and how can either of us end the agreement?
Why ask it
Retainers often run for a set number of months with a notice period after that. Find out what you would owe if you stopped in the middle of an application and whether the half finished draft comes to you. Contract terms differ by country and state, so have whoever reviews your agreements read this one.
After the deadline
Do you handle reports and renewals, or only new proposals?
Why ask it
Reporting is where funders decide whether to give again, and it is the work most often left undone when a contract covers submissions only. Ask whether reports sit inside the scope or get billed separately, and at what rate.
If a funder says no, who asks for the reviewers' comments?
Why ask it
Many funders will share scores or a few lines of feedback when asked, and some will not. The request usually lands better from your director than from a contractor, with the writer preparing the questions and folding the answers into the next attempt.
If we are funded, will you help us set up what the award requires us to track?
Why ask it
The proposal commits you to numbers, and someone has to start collecting them in the first month. The person who drafted those outcomes is well placed to list them for program staff. Without that list, the first report becomes an exercise in rebuilding a year from memory.
What does our boilerplate look like when you are finished, and do we keep it?
Why ask it
The organizational description, history, staff biographies and outcome language get reused for years. Getting all of it back in a document you own is often worth more than any single grant they write for you.
Who keeps the funder research and the deadline calendar if we stop working together?
Why ask it
The prospect list, the contact notes and the calendar of report dates are worth as much as the drafts. Put ownership in the contract and ask for everything in files you can edit, because a calendar that lives only in the writer's software leaves with the writer.
After a year, how should we judge whether hiring you has worked?
Why ask it
Money awarded is the obvious measure, but decisions lag the work by months. A fair scorecard also counts proposals submitted on time, new funders approached and reusable material built, and a writer who proposes those measures unprompted is planning to be held to them.
Could you coach one of our staff to take over part of this?
Why ask it
For a small organization the long term aim may be doing more of this in house. Some writers will review a staff member's drafts or teach them the calendar for less than the cost of writing everything, and a reluctant answer tells you how long they expect the arrangement to last.
Hiring and working with a grant writer
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before you hire anyone
- Decide what you actually need. Prospect research, writing, budget work and reporting are four different jobs, and an agreement that scopes only one of them leaves the other three to be argued about later.
- Put your financial statements, proof of charitable status, board list and last year's outcome numbers in one folder first. Any writer you hire will ask for them in the first week, and a candidate who asks in the interview is showing you how they work.
- Be honest about whether the program exists yet. Writing a proposal for something that is still an idea is possible, but it is different work and it takes longer.
- Check whether your team could absorb the grant if you won it. Reporting requirements on a modest award can cost more staff time than the award covers.
- Set the money for the hire aside from unrestricted funds before the first interview. The fee cannot wait on an award, so it has to be affordable even if the first few applications are declined.
Running the interview
Questions to ask a grantwriter on contract and on staff
Nearly every question here works for both, with a few changes. For a contractor, spend most of the time under Working together and Fees and contract, since the agreement is the whole relationship. For a staff grant writer, swap the fee questions for salary, reporting line and who covers during leave, and lean on Their approach, because an employee will be writing in your name every week. Staff or freelance, the job you are testing is identical: reading a funder closely and getting accurate material out of busy people.
Read the samples before the call
Ask for the two proposals in advance and read them with the funder's guidelines open beside you, if those are public. Check whether each answer responds to the question that was asked, whether the budget and the narrative describe one and the same program, and whether you could explain the project to a stranger afterwards. Then use the call for what a sample cannot show: how much of it was theirs, and what the client was like to get information from.
Keep the groups in order
Track record comes first because a writer with no experience near your field or your kind of funder is not a candidate, however well the conversation goes. Their approach and Funder fit show judgment, which is harder to see in a portfolio. Leave Fees and contract until both sides think it could work, and close with After the deadline, where the answers show whether they think past the submit button.
Put the same core questions to every candidate
Pick eight or ten of the 57 and ask each person in the same words, then write the answers down the same day. The ones on proposals submitted and funded, percentage pay, lead time before a deadline, and what would stop them taking you on are worth laying side by side. Three interviews is usually enough, and a paid single proposal with the front runner settles more than a fourth.
How grant writers charge
Hourly, per proposal, and monthly retainer are the three normal structures and all three are legitimate. Hourly work needs an agreed cap per proposal and a rule for what happens when a funder changes requirements mid draft. Per proposal pricing needs the deliverable written down, because a full federal application and a two page letter of inquiry are both proposals and pricing them the same makes no sense. Retainers suit organizations with a steady calendar of applications and reports rather than one large deadline. What is not a normal structure is payment as a percentage of money awarded, which the sector's ethics codes treat as unacceptable. Whichever you choose, grant writing is usually a fundraising cost paid from general funds, since most funders will not pay for the work of applying to them.
What the writer will need from you
- One person who can answer questions within a day or two. If that can only be the executive director, say so in the interview, because a writer waiting on answers cannot protect the deadline.
- Financial statements and a current organizational budget in a form your finance person will stand behind.
- Program numbers: who you served, how many, over what period, with what result.
- Access to the staff who actually deliver the program, not only to leadership.
- A named person for sign off, and enough lead time to get a signature without chasing.
Warning signs
- A promised success rate, or any assurance that a particular funder will say yes.
- Willingness to work for a percentage of the award.
- No questions about your programs, budget or outcome data in the first conversation.
- A portfolio they will not let you read, even in redacted form.
- Reluctance to name past clients, or references you are not allowed to contact.
- A plan built entirely on large national funders when your organization has no track record with any of them.